Orsted CEO says abandoning US wind projects a 'real option'
(www.offshore-mag.com)
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A simple way to compare energy sources is their capacity factor. A capacity factor describes how intensely a fleet of generators is run. It is a ratio of a fleet's actual generation to its maximum potential generation (according to the Energy Information Agency, EIA). For example nuclear is 80-90%. Coal is 50-60%. Wind is 30-40%. Solar is about 20% Another measure on cost is what is called Levelized Cost. It takes into account all the costs (initial investment and running costs). Conventional coal is 94.8 $/MWh and offshore wind is 243.2. The EIA is a great source for some of the items you listed.
And does the Levelized Cost account for future degradation of the wind turbines, and absolute degradation of solar panels?
Levelized Cost takes into account the replacement costs of an energy source. I don't know how solar and wind get rated because their efficiencies have supposedly improved with time. I should look that up.
The latest EIA publication on Levelized Cost is so complicated. Those economists have gone wild. They have now added battery storage. What is interesting is that they project the costs into the future and take account of two types of tax credits. There will be a phase out of credits over time. But what I find concerning is that the renewables will be built and added to the grid before these credits expire and we will be stuck with them. Another thing I noticed is how they have managed to make it look how renewables now compete nuclear and fossils fuels (which was not the case in the past). source: https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/electricity_generation.pdf
There are SOOOO many fraudulent people (or just so brainwashed into thinking what they are doing is good) in SOOOO many facets of our country! I have a feeling my retirement account will depreciate even more than it has in the past 18 months!
You will own nothing and be happy - eat ze bugs
While Capacity Factors may be interesting to some I feel that an understanding of exactly how much space a so-called renewable solution would occupy would be interesting to many more.
For instance, would we need to fill Rhode Island with wind turbines to satisfy the USA's energy requirements or would we need to fill Texas, or Alaska, or several Alaskas?
Levelized Cost is also a con that does not tell the whole story. Comparing a working solution with an intermittent solution is not a fair comparison particularly as the failings of the intermittent system impose extra costs on to the working system. Also, the intermittent systems should really include storage costs to iron out that intermittency but they do not. The cost to make up the difference falls to the conventional energy sector.
I agree with you about Levelized Cost but it is what is used to consider cost by economists (they like their formulas). So even using that formula shows the extra cost of wind and solar over time. Area is not considered in any calculation. We had this problem with solar in New Jersey. The solar warriors wanted to build solar farms but we have very limited open space in the state. We also have a very strong Preserve Farmland group that put up strong opposition. So then the state wanted to put them on brownfields (disserted manufacturing sites). Turns out that would be an environmental disaster. We have many superfund sites in this state. So that's when we came up with installing solar panels on telephone poles. We put up a lot but stopped for some reason.
There is another bad aspect to wind turbines on land - their noise.
Also what you say about area is harder to compare when considering offshore wind. .
I think the area question is "overlooked" on purpose by the proponents of renewable energy. The UK's largest power station would need a couple of hundred square miles of solar panels to replace it - probably even more if you take into account UK weather and latitude.
In the US, the Ivanpah solar plant hd to be scaled back because it was impinging too much on the habitat of the desert tortoise. The site covers approaching six square miles and it produces less energy than a single coal-fired generator - and even then it has to be warmed up each day with gas!
I did the calculation I suggested for the USA and an area of eight times that of Texas would need to be covered in wind farms to power the entire USA. OK, that will be a high estimate because efficiency of current methods was not taken into account but total energy, not just electricity, was considered.
I think that if people started from the land-use end rather than the "who likes pollution" end we might have some more realistic discussions.
Yes that is a great point. People get so emotional about renewable energy. They think of themselves as ecowarriors. It's been a great pysop.